Should Caribbean schools have a summer programme this year?

Across the Caribbean region, ministries of education are seeking to have a  Government-mandated summer school programme. We discuss the issue, and highlight four (of many) challenges that are likely to thwart the success of the programme.

 

In anticipation of the end of the school year in the Caribbean over the next week or so, ministries of education in some countries, such as Barbados and Jamaica, have been making plan to have a summer school programme for primary and secondary students, thus creating a fourth term and extending the school year. However, teachers’ unions have been objecting to the ministries’ plans, and it is not yet clear whether summer schools will be (in fact) in session.

Without a doubt, and over the past 15 months, the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted schools and education worldwide. Across the Caribbean region and pre-pandemic, in-person teaching modalities were virtually ubiquitous. To varying degrees, technology and electronic (e-)learning were being adopted, but essentially, they were only supplementing face-to-face teaching.

Hence when distance and remote learning modalities had to be adopted, neither the ministries of education, the schools, the teachers or the students were fully prepared to do so. Several weeks of fumbling ensued, as the education system started to come to grips with the new paradigm. However, the virtually overnight transition from face-to-face to digital teaching and learning exposed some significant deficiencies. First, in our telecoms and ICT infrastructure, particularly the quality of the service that is experienced, and the limited coverage of the fixed-line broadband network in some countries. Second, a relatively large proportion of students do not have ready access to the internet and/or a suitable device, in order to participate in their classes remotely. For these students, class attendance has been sporadic and in missing four and a half terms of school – since March 2020 – they would have fallen behind, and not achieve the standard required to be promoted to the next grade.

It is thus understandable why ministries of education have sought to intervene, and have proposed the summer school programme. However, there are several reasons that have resulted in students not being able to keep pace with the requirements of their particular grade whilst engaged in remote learning. We outline four challenges which ministries of education ought to address, in order to improve the effectiveness of e-learning in the region.

 

Teachers still in need of training and development

Although ministries of education across the region had been offering teacher e-learning training programmes over the past few years, from all reports, delivery of those programmes were sporadic in many instances. Teachers were lucky if they got e-learning training once a year, and pre-COVID-19, the training programmes were likely to be quite basic, as digital and remote learning modalities would generally be considered optional, and not the primary mode of teaching. As a result, many teachers have had to learn on the fly, and there may still be gaps in their understanding of technology, e-learning, and the best ways to deliver their lessons in the digital space.

Additionally, it must be emphasised that the best practices for delivering lessons in person – such as ‘the chalk and talk’ – tend to be vastly different from those in a remote learning environment. Teachers need to become better versed in these methods, and given the time to adjust their lesson plans accordingly.

 

Internet connectivity challenges still exist

As previously mentioned, the shift to remote working and learning in March 2020 challenged the resilience of the telecoms networks across the region. Although in the intervening months, most of the telcos have upgraded and expanded their infrastructure, to accommodate the increased traffic, challenges still exist, such as gaps in fixed and wireless broadband coverage, and perhaps more importantly, the quality of the internet service experienced.

To improve the telecoms service available in the region, requires considerable investment, which the major telcos are not prepared to do alone. As noted in our article, The politics of Universal Service Funds and the widening digital divide, the telcos have been advocating for financing to be made available through the Universal Access and/or Service Funds (UASFs) that have been established in many Caribbean countries. However, countries do not appear to be giving favourable consideration to that proposal.

Hence, thinking in the short term, that is for the summer school programmes, the connectivity challenges that have plagued schools and remote learning still exist. The poor service, slow service, dropped calls, and no services, are still likely to hamper teaching and learning, as have occurred over the past several months.

 

Service affordability challenges still exist

In a similar vein to the previous point, the affordability challenges that many households, particularly low-income households, have been experiencing still persist. Although parents may have smartphones, they may not be able to afford smartphones (or other suitable device) for each of their children, so that individually they can participate in their classes.

Additionally, and although mobile/cellular broadband internet coverage is quite extensive across most Caribbean countries, a significant portion of consumers are prepaid customers, and are unable to afford continuous access to internet service. Further, mobile/cellular access is device-focussed, that is, service is purchased for a specific device. Hence for a household with three school-aged children, at least three devices and three prepaid mobile broadband plans would be needed, which can be prohibitively expensive for low-income households in particular.

Having said this, many Caribbean governments have been purchasing tablet computers for students, which would alleviate that expense for families. However, the price for Internet service, especially if needed consistently for remote schooling, may still be beyond the budgets of many households, and so is still likely to be a challenge even for the summer school programmes.

 

Teachers (and perhaps even students) need a break

Finally, this point was made in an article published last week (22 June 2021) in an article published in Barbados Today, based on views expressed by the President of the Barbados Union of Teachers, Pedro Shepherd, on the Barbados Government’s intention to have a summer school programme this year. In addition to highlighting the fact that “the programme represents a stark deviation from the terms and conditions of their employment”, Mr. Shepherd indicated that teachers need the summer break to attend to their physical and mental wellbeing, particularly in these trying times.

From all accounts, online teaching is more demanding than in-person. Further, teachers would have been scrambling throughout the school year to adjust and augment their lesson plans for online delivery. Hence, in addition to recovering from the 2020/2021 school year, the summer break would allow teachers to regroup and to begin to prepare for the next school year.

 

Final thoughts

In summary, and although ministries of education are trying to ensure that students do not fall behind unduly, there seem to be a raft of challenges – a few of which have been outlined above – that are not being addressed and are likely to hamper the success of the proposed summer programmes. Should the summer school programme be implemented, it is likely that students who have been challenged in participating in online and remote classes, will continue to be challenged, and so will be even further behind by the start of the 2021/2022 school year.

 

 

Image credit: Mary Pahlke (Pixabay)